The globalization of the European white goods industry

This paper reassesses competitive strategies in the European white goods industry by revisiting the effectiveness of national, regional and global strategies. Changes to markets, manufacturing processes, cost drivers and greater sophistication in the co-ordination processes and internal learning mechanisms within global competitor firms provide an a priori for both the resurgence and the increased appropriateness of global strategies in this industry. The paper focuses on the effectiveness of national, regional and global strategies from the perspective of the historic positioning of the European competitors.